September 21, 2010

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Cracked by everyone!

Answer:

The first part is the original version of the song Nine Million Bicycles by Katie Melua. She was then criticized by Simon Singh for the inaccuracy of her song. She then recorded a corrected version of the song, which is the second part :-)

Simon Singh’s version of Katie Melua’s ‘Nine Million Bicycles’. The audio is from Michael Shermer’s TED talk.

shrey

The last bit of music is too familiar not to recognize.

Rahul Rajeev

In 2005, Katie Melua was criticised by writer and scientist Simon Singh for inaccurate lyrics in her song ‘Nine Million Bicycles’ referring to the size of the observable universe (“We are 12 billion light-years from the edge. That’s a guess — no-one can ever say it’s true”). Melua and Singh met, and Melua re-recorded a tongue-in-cheek version of the song that had been written by Singh:
“We are 13.7 billion light-years from the edge of the observable universe; that’s a good estimate with well-defined error bars/and with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you”.
Later Melua revealed that she ‘should have known better’ as she used to be a member of the Astronomy club at school.

Katie Melua, a British pop singer came under some criticism from a scientist because she predicted that the age of the universe was 12 billion light years. She later sang a revised version of the song replacing it with 13.7 billion light years.

What a question. :)
Katie Melua’s Nine Million Bicycles.
She revised her estimate after Simon Singh told her the accurate distance.

dineshk

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Katie Melua’s single “Nine million bicycles” has lyrics that imply that scientists guess the age of the universe to be 12 billion years. Simon Singh got all scientific on her and she agreed to re-record a version which is scientifically more accurate. Now Simon Singh can turn his attention to the other 8 million songs out there with scientific inaccuracies.

Simon Singh commented Katie Melua’s song 9 Million Bicycles and made it scientifically correct. And Katie apparently corrected the lyrics later.

Manish Achuth

16

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Song – Nine Million Bicycles by Katie Melua.
The song says “We are 12 billion light years away from the edge.” Simon Singh criticized it for inaccurate lyrics. Katie recorded a tongue in cheek version with words by Simon Singh.

Rahulk

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In 2005, Melua was criticised by writer and scientist Simon Singh for inaccurate lyrics referring to the size of the observable universe (“We are 12 billion light-years from the edge. That’s a guess — no-one can ever say it’s true”). Melua and Singh met, and Melua re-recorded a tongue-in-cheek version of the song that had been written by Singh:
“We are 13.7 billion light-years from the edge of the observable universe; that’s a good estimate with well-defined error bars/and with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you”.

krudebox

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Darn it! Its in light years.. Its not age, but the distance to the edge of the observable universe.

jowens

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Singer Katie Melua was criticized for taking poetic license with the age of the universe, which is estimated to be 14 billion years old not 12.

Parody of the song 9 million bicycles… The original song says we are 12 billion light years away from the edge but after a astronomer tells her its 13.7 billion she rewrites the song…
p.s Cool Question

ht

Katie Melua’s ‘corrected’ version of the song ‘Nine Million Bicycles’ after Simon Singh’s comment on the accuracy of the lyrics.